The Cantina Staring Back At You From The Abyss

lilyWhite said:

I could never understand the mindset of "[creator] is now the worst ever because I like all of their other stuff but I don't like their new thing". Just one of the joys of being a creator.

I don't care about Taylor Swift, but it's not like what anyone else likes is any of my concern. Someone wants to sing that bit that E.F.B. parodied to themselves, they can go right on ahead, as long as they don't care about me singing "All aboard on the ghost ship of CANNIBAL RATS!" Seriously, I can't get that song out of my head.

(And if someone is complaining about Nickelback, I'll just turn up the volume and drown them out. )

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It's even funnier when the creator's new work is better than their previous. Reminds me of when Games Workshop released Warhammer: Age of Sigmar, a revamp of their previous Warhammer Fantasy Battles miniature wargame, which was a welcome change because it utilized a much simpler and straightforward system of rules and cleared away the bloated fractal spreadsheet nightmare that was WFB. It also made the lore much more campy in tone, which was a welcome change from the "super-serious" Tolkien-esque generic fantasy world that the previous game was set in. Needless to say, the fanboys threw a tantrum, usually throwing around the argument that "GW has dumbed it down for the filthy casuals!"

ManWithTheMetalArm said:

the fanboys threw a tantrum, usually throwing around the argument that "GW has dumbed it down for the filthy casuals!"

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I'm actually surprised to hear this is a term used in table-top gaming as well. I always thought it was a strictly a video game slur.

Shoeless said:

I'm actually surprised to hear this is a term used in table-top gaming as well. I always thought it was a strictly a video game slur.

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Well, that's more of a generalization on my part, but I could always see that behind their words, no matter what they said. Most of them were just mad that GW tried something different, mainly because WFB had tanked in revenue over the years. Oh the horror.

Pfff... Have been helping out with bigsis moving house for the last few weeks. Barely have had any time to prep for my september holiday trip. Or anything else for that matter.

But today I shall do nothing but relax! Possibly with a combination of chocolate, tea, computer games and that lovely kickstarter artbook that arrived last week and I haven't been even able to as much as look at.

Take heed! Those that today intend to mention something that even suggests anything remotely resembling 'effort', shall be fed to Elisabeth the Kraken.

The dream plot bunnies struck last night! I just woke up and wrote a three page outline. I'm so excited, but have at least two projects in the queue ahead... realistically three. Ugh, but yay!

Mary Love said:

The dream plot bunnies struck last night! I just woke up and wrote a three page outline. I'm so excited, but have at least two projects in the queue ahead... realistically three. Ugh, but yay!

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Yay! I wish that would happen to me more often. My dreams lately just haven't been very plot-bunny worthy.



Uuuuugh, sleepy morning is sleepy. I got all the craft things done yesterday, but not much writing. Hoping to turn the internet off today and do nothing but teh werdz for as long as I can.

first draft done! editing, start!

I think I'm going to publish this as an ebook on Amazon. it would defs fall into the "short" category, so I'd charge $0.99 for it (most stories of the same length seem around that). of course, that's after TONS of editing. but, that's the plan right now. trying not to freak myself out. I was published once before, but only as part of an anthology. I WON'T LET IMPOSTER SYNDROME WIN. I WILL DO THE THING.

Yay for words and outlines!

Shadowflame said:

Hubby's surgery went well yesterday. Got home later in the afternoon. Napped and he's back to surfing the internet, doing his hand stretches and gaming. The dr said to use his hands as much as possible so he's doing that.

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Gotta game, doctor's orders.

Jade A said:

first draft done! editing, start!

I think I'm going to publish this as an ebook on Amazon. it would defs fall into the "short" category, so I'd charge $0.99 for it (most stories of the same length seem around that). of course, that's after TONS of editing. but, that's the plan right now. trying not to freak myself out. I was published once before, but only as part of an anthology. I WON'T LET IMPOSTER SYNDROME WIN. I WILL DO THE THING.

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Good going on that. Imposter syndrome is tough. I'm struggling with a bit of that myself right now, but all you can do is keep writing and just try to ignore the voice telling you "This sucks and so do you."

Shoeless said:

Good going on that. Imposter syndrome is tough. I'm struggling with a bit of that myself right now, but all you can do is keep writing and just try to ignore the voice telling you "This sucks and so do you."

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thanks we got this!

Jade A said:

first draft done! editing, start!

I think I'm going to publish this as an ebook on Amazon. it would defs fall into the "short" category, so I'd charge $0.99 for it (most stories of the same length seem around that). of course, that's after TONS of editing. but, that's the plan right now. trying not to freak myself out. I was published once before, but only as part of an anthology. I WON'T LET IMPOSTER SYNDROME WIN. I WILL DO THE THING.

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I seem to recall hearing that impostor syndrome means you're doing it right.

anyone who liked the original death note, don't make yourself watch the new one. the writing hurt

Religion0 said:

I seem to recall hearing that impostor syndrome means you're doing it right.

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thanks

There were parts of the anime Death Note that I liked, but a lot that I didn't, so I guess this probably means the film adaptation isn't for me either.

Friendly Frog said:

Take heed! Those that today intend to mention something that even suggests anything remotely resembling 'effort', shall be fed to Elisabeth the Kraken.

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So y'all won't never guess what I did do this day, I buckled down and buckled up and strapped in and held tight, put in all the *&^%$* I could and didn't shy from the blows that came my way. I used all my might, all my magic, all my grit, glamour, and gumption and I DID it with an A+ for !@#$%* where "*&^%$" is supposed to mean effort

SO, what I did was.... drum roll please? *Drums roll....* GMed a game of pseudo-D&D in a not totally awful fashion in spite of everything that could possibly be performed lacklusterly being performed horrendously!! :'O I was awful and bad and not very good. And yet, to judge by my players willingness to arrange another sesh wid meh, I think I also did all right.... :')

Religion0 said:

I seem to recall hearing that impostor syndrome means you're doing it right.

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QFT I hope

Yzjdriel said:

That depends entirely on whether your group is meeting in person or via a service hosted on the interwebs (e.g., Roll20). If you're meeting in person, it's easier to keep things in your head as there are fewer distractions. If you're online, a map is nearly mandatory or else there really isn't a point to using an online service.

Putting that bit aside:

The Long Answer

Speaking as a DM with a great deal of experience playing in bad campaigns and then later on going to make the same mistakes the DMs of said campaigns made, I'll give you this advice:

Use the following steps to determine whether to use a board or not:

Is the session going to:

If the answer to even a single part of any of the above is 'yes', you are going to need a map for at least part of the session.

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Short answer

ALWAYS be able to produce a map for anything you're doing, but if your party is willing and able to keep things in their heads, that's totally fine so long as you can keep it in your head as well. In my experience, having a map is never a bad thing, though places like large cities are usually best left in Roleplay Ville, where many will argue they belong.

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I had the paper ready for mapping, and I already had an actual map for the world it was set in (courtesy of yours truly and dearest Rel's inspiration!), and I just didn't end up needing it! :O :O :O It all seemed to so well understood, they just asked all the right questions and it was great (aside from where I was terrible)!

ManWithTheMetalArm said:

It's even funnier when the creator's new work is better than their previous. Reminds me of when Games Workshop released Warhammer: Age of Sigmar, a revamp of their previous Warhammer Fantasy Battles miniature wargame, which was a welcome change because it utilized a much simpler and straightforward system of rules and cleared away the bloated fractal spreadsheet nightmare that was WFB. It also made the lore much more campy in tone, which was a welcome change from the "super-serious" Tolkien-esque generic fantasy world that the previous game was set in. Needless to say, the fanboys threw a tantrum, usually throwing around the argument that "GW has dumbed it down for the filthy casuals!"

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This is why I used LOTR models instead!!

Getting the words out was like pulling teeth tonight. Can't figure out if I'm forcing it because the story took a wrong turn somewhere, if I'm burning out/losing faith in this project, or if I'm fine. I'm just writing and writing is hard.

The SFF short story I was refining yesterday turned abruptly into a novella. Of course it did.

Heard from Corpus Christi-area friends: it took them 8 hours but they got to Midland safely. They've seen pics of their neighborhood (but not their house) and it's not hopeful. Massive damage, river flooding starting now. They're considering not going back to the coast. (You could not pay me to live on or near Gulf Coast.)

Heard from South Houston friends, who evacuated before the worst rains hit. Problem with Houston: way too much flatland and not enough flood control. They may have to evacuate from yesterday's 'safe zone'.

The hurricane missed the Rio Grande Valley where I'm currently at. We were supposed to get the back side of it but it moved north a bit and missed us. I discovered watching the news that although I had gone inland, if Harvey had actually hit here it wasn't even close to being far enough inland. Lesson learned. Number one lesson learned is don't be down here during hurricane season.

I am very worried for the people I know in the path of this monster. I won't stop worrying until the storm is gone and everyone has reported in. The news reports coming in are horrible.

stay safe everyone

Damoclian said:

So y'all won't never guess what I did do this day, I buckled down and buckled up and strapped in and held tight, put in all the *&^%$* I could and didn't shy from the blows that came my way. I used all my might, all my magic, all my grit, glamour, and gumption and I DID it with an A+ for !@#$%* where "*&^%$" is supposed to mean effort

SO, what I did was.... drum roll please? *Drums roll....* GMed a game of pseudo-D&D in a not totally awful fashion in spite of everything that could possibly be performed lacklusterly being performed horrendously!! :'O I was awful and bad and not very good. And yet, to judge by my players willingness to arrange another sesh wid meh, I think I also did all right.... :')

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I'm sure you did better than you think you did!

There's some flooding in parts of Austin, but so far it's mostly the close-to-creeks and low-lying areas that typically flood. It's not even close to as bad as the Memorial Day floods two years ago. It's Houston and the surrounding areas that are in serious trouble. And Houston has a lot of vulnerable populations.

In a mild bit of fun news, I documented my assembly of a tiny arcade cabinet on Twitter yesterday, powered by a tinyduino. The casing did not fit together easily, so the whole thing took much longer than I expected. I had to take it back apart and file down some of the tabs so they'd actually fit together. At the end of the tweet thread is a video of MrJJ playing a game.

Afternoon, Cantina. Behold all the purty yarn (and two neck forms) I bought at Michael's! They finally got the Caron Cakes yarn in and I went a little nuts... But the good news is I had enough coupons to take $24 off my purchase. #powershopping


Other good news is that today was the last week with the current group of first grade Sunday school kids and even though I had a slight panic attack (literally got shaky) because I saw that the two boys who absolutely MUST be separated due to their behavioral problems were both there at the same time again, all four of us teachers were also there as opposed to just me and my mom and we were able to keep everything under control, play a game with the kids, and have a good, positive last day with them. They really were good kids overall, we just really needed the proper number of adults in the room to manage their...energeticness. There will be no Sunday school next week, but the week after that, we get the new group of kids, which is always exciting.

Oh, also,I realized today that the group of fifth grade students now leaving the children's area and going upstairs to join the youth group are the kids who were in my VERY FIRST Sunday school class 5-going-on-6 years ago. A) Have I really been volunteering that long??? B) That makes me feel old, but C) MY LITTLE BIRDIES ARE SO BIG AND GROWING UP AND I'M SO PROUD AND PROBABLY GOING TO CRY AT SOME POINT WAAAAAAAH!




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Stay safe, everyone experiencing weather issues! <3

Things I would have preferred not to research today: Field dressing a deer. Thank you, hunter-ed.com for using animated illustrations and not real photos. You will never know how much I appreciate that.

Ugh. Deer hunting, did that early in my teens, may it never be necessary for me again.

Niiiiice yarn, Effby.

E.F.B. said:

Things I would have preferred not to research today: Field dressing a deer. Thank you, hunter-ed.com for using animated illustrations and not real photos. You will never know how much I appreciate that.

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Sounds useful to know for fantasy writers, though. Might need to look that up later.

Filigree said:

Ugh. Deer hunting, did that early in my teens, may it never be necessary for me again.

Niiiiice yarn, Effby.

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It's sooooo soft, too!

Religion0 said:

Sounds useful to know for fantasy writers, though. Might need to look that up later.

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Not a bad idea. It was very necessary for me to research, especially with there being a huntsman in my Snow White retelling. I didn't even have to describe the field dressing, since it was already finished when the characters found the huntsman, but I was able to use the info to create what I hope is a more realistic setting in that scene. It was an important scene, too, so I'm glad to have gotten it written.

Today, I doubt I'll get to write so much. Going to have to eat breakfast and leave because there are two doctor's appointments to go to. One for my dad and one for me. Whee.

Morning cantina! Starting school today, yay me! Might be losing my really good job at Lowes though. Boo. But anyway, I've been wording, mostly stuff about my two MCs and a few interesting side-characters I plan to do a few things with, mainly an alien prince in hiding, a devious, manipulating mermaid lady who is utterly loyal to the mercenary captain, a robot assassin, and the mercenary captain herself, a big, buff, lizard-lady who goes to battle wielding a laser cannon. Scifi is awesome